12th April 2023 12:10 PM

PhonDAWG - Phonetics Lab Data Analysis Working Group

We will look at Binna's Icelandic data with the R emmeans function, and Sam will discuss how to quantify noise in ElectroGlottograph measurements.   

14th April 2023 12:10 PM

Phonetics Lab Meeting

We will continue our discussion of P. Smolensky's Information Processing in Dynamical Systems: Foundations of Harmony Theory,  1986. 

Please read through the end of section 1 (up to page 213).

19th April 2023 12:10 PM

PhonDAWG - Phonetics Lab Data Analysis Working Group

Bayesian Regression tutorial,  part 1

20th April 2023 04:30 PM

Cornell Linguistics Circle & Linguistics Colloquium Speaker: Dr. James Crippen of McGill University

The Department of Linguistics and the Cornell Linguistics Circle proudly presents Dr. James Crippen, Assistant Professor at the Department of Linguistics, McGill University, who will give a lecture on "The syntactic derivation of complex verb morphology and so-called ‘polysynthesis’ in Tlingit"
 

Abstract:

Languages in the Na-Dene (= Dene-Eyak-Tlingit) language family are among the North American Indigenous languages famed for the morphological complexity of their verbs.

I argue based on an extremely broad range of empirical evidence that the verb words in Tlingit are complex syntactic structures encompassing the whole of AspP. Each morpheme in the verb is a syntactic terminal variously instantiating argument structure, event structure, aspect, mood, or modality, all based on an acategorial root. Ordering of terminals is a consequence of regular syntactic structure formed by Merge and conditioned by selection, agreement, and semantic and phonological constraints.

The syntax in the Tlingit verb requires no extraordinary theoretical mechanisms beyond vanilla Minimalism. Position-class slot-and-filler templates are unnecessary, as are dedicated morphological operations, and ‘polysynthesis’ is discarded as uninformative. Discontinuous morphology does not exist in the system: long distance dependencies between syntactic terminals are instances of phase-based movement and agreement along with compositional semantic operations.

The appearance of a verb as a single word is irrelevant for the syntax, arising from the highly constrained phonological content of the syntactic terminals and the regular mapping of syntactic structures to domains within a recursive phonological word.

This analysis raises significant questions about supposedly irregular or unanalyzable phenomena, with interesting consequences for theories of phonology, syntax, and semantics.

Bio:

Dzéiwsh James A. Crippen joined the Department of Linguistics at McGill University in 2021. He received his PhD in linguistics at the University of British Columbia in 2019 with a dissertation on syntactic structure in the Tlingit language.

Dzéiwsh is Tlingit, a member of the Kaaḵáakʼw Hít (Basket/Arch House) of the Deisheetaan clan in the Raven moiety (Laayineidí) and a child of the Sʼiknax̱.ádi clan in the Wolf/Eagle moiety. He comes from the Shtaxʼhéen Ḵwáan (Stikine) in Ḵaachx̱an.áakʼw (Wrangell, Alaska). He lives among and works primarily with the Daḵká Lingít (Inland Tlingit people) of the Deisḻeen Ḵwáan (Teslin), Taageesh Ḵwáan (Tagish & Carcross, Yukon), and Aatlein Ḵwáan (Atlin, BC).

His research interests revolve around the Tlingit language, covering all aspects of its structure and use. He works primarily on morphology and syntax in Tlingit, looking at its interfaces with the lexicon, phonology, and information structure. Having a background in historical linguistics, he also studies linguistic phenomena both diachronically and synchronically in related languages.

As a student of traditional Tlingit knowledge, he explores many issues in orality (conversation, narrative, and oratory), art, and history. As an indigenous person doing research in his own community, he encounters and studies the mismatches between traditional Tlingit ethics and ethical rules in Canadian and American academia.